FON, the international company trying to build a global network of freely available Wi-Fi, took a big step forward last week when it signed a deal with British Telecom (BT) to form BT FON, a joint venture, which BTs reps say will become the worlds largest Wi-Fi community.

FONs existing (and somewhat inscrutable) business model has garnered them a following of what they claim is a half-million-member community of people offering up their own Wi-Fi networks for sharing. FON users (Foneros) can also access 190,000 hotspots worldwide for free or nearly free, based on whether they are Bills or Linuses (as in Gates and Torvalds). No word yet on whether BT FON customers will get new monikers--Bonos perhaps?

BTs more than three million paying broadband customers will be invited to join the new BT FON community of users who open their home (or business) Wi-Fi networks to other Foneros. BT FON will also offer a significant number of additional free hotspots.

If you think the notion of communal Wi-Fi sounds too good to be true, its worth noting that Google is among FONs investors, which lends the venture a serious bit of credence. While Earthlink and other vendors struggle to find the magic beans that will sprout into profitable, affordable, or even just practical municipal Wi-Fi, BT FON is trying a distinctively UK-version that actually makes some senseat least in cultures inclined to share.

We are launching a peoples network of Wi-Fi, which could one day cover every street in Britain, says Gavin Patterson, BT Group managing director, Consumer Division.

We are giving our millions of Total Broadband customers a choice and an opportunity. If they are prepared to securely share a little of their broadband, they can share the broadband at hundreds of thousands of FON and BT Openzone hotspots today, without paying a penny.

We have built a public Wi-Fi network and 12 Wireless Cities already, but today we are saying to customers, lets build a Wi-Fi community together, which covers everywhere and serves everyone.

BT and FON are building it; now we wait and see if the people will come.

Originally published on .

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